Scarlet
by Arkaidy
Summary: A few months after Teyla Emmagan arrived in the City of the Ancestors, a sort of dark red flower began to bloom on all the lapels of the Lanteans jackets.


**Scarlet  
**By Vega

_"Stargate: Atlants" and all related characters and concepts are property of MGM studios. This story is a work of fiction, created for entertainment purposes only. Not copyright infringement is intended.

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Sometime around the third month after Teyla Emmagan of the Athosian Peoples came to call the City of the Ancestors home, she noticed that flowers began to bloom on the Lantean's lapels.

They were little red flowers made of hand-cut cloth, a deep shade of scarlet, with black felt eyes in the centre. Specifically, they seemed to appear on the left lapel of the lab coats and Expedition uniforms of the scientists and soldiers who had the red and white emblem of an Earth nation called Ka-na-da sewn on their arms. The first one appeared on the coat of the 'gateroom technician who worked closely under Peter Grodin. Teyla remembered it because she thought it was such a lovely little touch to add to the otherwise cool colour schemes of the Ancestor's City. A splash of warmth.

His flower was plastic, the only one.

The second one she spotted on the nurse who was always best at bullying Doctor McKay into sitting still for the IV after a mission gone wrong. She was also Ka-nay-di-n. The third was on one of the men who worked the breakfast shift in the mess hall, the kind man who always remembered to give Teyla an extra helping of the things called "Fruit Loops," because she liked the way they crunched. His flag was the blue and red overlapping "x" motif of the people from En-ga-land. Sometimes they also called that nation the "U.K.", and it confused Teyla.

When the fourth bloomed on Dr. McKay's labcoat, Teyla realized that these flowers were not merely sprigs of colour added to dull garments.

These little scarlet flowers were symbolic of something.

Teyla chewed on this thought carefully, rolling it over and over again in her mind, watching and waiting to see if any more flowers spread. Soon everyone from Ka-na-da or Eng-ga-land had a flower. Teyla observed Dr. Beckett giving each of his medical staff one. After a few days, both Lt. Ford and Major Sheppard sported the flowers, though they never wore them on missions outside of the City. And then, one morning, the Lanteans were all wearing them, as if Major Sheppard's display had been a silent allowance or approval.

Atlantis blossomed in a sea of scarlet.

And suddenly Teyla felt like the odd one out. She had no scarlet flower, no blood-shot bloom, and perhaps, she felt, she should.

So she went to Dr. Weir's office. If anyone, the cultural and diplomatic expert of the expedition should be able to explain.

Through the glass door, Teyla cold see that Elizabeth Weir was at her desk, talking in low tones with the Ka-na-di-an 'gate technician, and Dr. McKay, and Major Sheppard, and a few others from Eng-ga-land or Scot-land that she didn't know as well as she would have liked. They seemed to be in serious discussion, so Teyla decided to return later. She lowered the hand she had raised to tap on the glass door, but Dr. Weir caught the motion and motioned for Teyla to enter.

Teyla pulled back the door slowly and said, "My apologies for interrupting, Dr. Weir."

Dr. Weir shook her head and spread her hands and said, "We're done. Come in, Teyla. What can I do for you?"

The group in Weir's office disbanded. Teyla stepped to the side so they could pass her on the cat walk. For a such a group, they seemed oddly sombre. Major Sheppard and Dr. McKay lingered by the door once they'd gone through it, waiting for her to finish her business with Dr. Weir. Waiting to walk with her wherever she or they were headed next, because that's what friends did for each other on Atlantis.

Teyla entered the office and sat in the chair that Dr. Weir indicated. She pointed at the empty space on her own jacket where there was conspicuously no flower. "I am curious," Teyla began, "about the scarlet flowers."

Dr. Weir blinked. Her eyes cut to Teyla's jacket, and she seemed to realize for the first time that Teyla was not wearing one.

"Oh, Teyla," she said, sounding mildly humiliated. "I'm so sorry. I can't believe that we... that _I_ didn't explain..." Dr. Weir reached into her desk draw and withdrew one of the small flowers made of red cloth. There was safety pin sewn on the back, the kind that were in the small tins in the emergency medical kits.

"Do not apologize," Teyla said, even as she took the flower from Dr. Weir and fixed it on her own jacket above her heart.

"No, I should have," Dr. Weir insisted, "right when we started wearing them. I can understand how they might be a bit confusing."

"Then they do symbolize something?" Teyla asked, adjusting the flower so it sat just so. She folded her hands in her lap and waited.

Dr. Weir stood, went over to the small electric kettle she kept on a cabinet of books against the wall and poured them both a round, handle-less cup of tea. Teyla found the Earth tea slightly weak, especially compared to the bracing tea the Athosian people drank every morning to ready them for the day. But there was a hint of something that Dr. Weir had once called 'va-ni-la', and that Teyla enjoyed very much. Sipping the hot cup, Teyla joined Dr. Weir on her more comfortable so-fah. Dr. Weir only moved discussions to the so-fah if they were going to be informal or long. Teyla did not mind either.

Setting down her own cup after a few cursory sips, Dr. Weir ran her hands through her hair, obviously searching for a place to begin the explanation.

"We wear the poppies," she began, then stopped herself. "These, these red flowers are, uh, a representation of a flower from Earth. Called a poppy."

Teyla nodded.

"Well, we wear... well, no, not _we, _because mostly it's a Canadian tradition, well, the UK too, but John – Major Sheppard – thought it may be good for morale to maybe hold a service, you know, for the people we've already lost, so we... oh, no, that's a horrible place to start, too." Elizabeth looked a little shamefaced. "Look, Teyla," she said honestly, "I don't know very much about this. I'm American, and we do things a little differently. We have parades and picnics and fireworks."

"I understand Doctor," Teyla said. "Just start wherever you think is best."

Elizabeth took a sip of tea to cover her contemplative silence. Then she said, cradling the steaming cup in her hands, "I don't know if you know this, Teyla, but there have been some pretty big wars back on Earth, in the past. World Wars, we call them, because pretty much every developed nation on Earth was involved. The last one ended about sixty years ago."

Teyla's eyes got a little rounder at the startling news, but she said nothing. The expedition members all wore the emblems and spoke the languages of many different nations. There did not seem to be any sort of tension between the different factions.

"I won't go in to the reasons for the wars," Dr. Weir went on, "because then we'd be here all day. The countries of Earth, now ... mostly... recognize that the wars were pretty bad. Things happened, people hurt. Horrible, atrocious things done to so many innocent people, by soldiers on all sides. Well, all the nations recognize that we should never do it again. Each country has found, in their own way, a means by which to remember the wars and the horrors they caused. They honour and thank the dead for giving their lives, and promise to keep the peace that was so dearly bought. The Canadians," and here she pointed to the cloth poppy on her breast, "wear poppies and have a ceremony on November 11th."

"Ah," Teyla said, realization and understanding sliding into place. "And today is the tenth day of the month of November."

"Yes," Dr. Weir said.

"And so you wish to recreate this ... Poppy Ceremony... in order to...?" Teyla asked.

Dr. Weir smiled slightly out of the corner of her mouth. "They call it 'Remembrance Day.' And yes, we're going to hold a small ceremony in the 'gateroom tomorrow morning. To... to honour the good people we've lost from the expedition. Major Sheppard is going to say a few words. I think Dr. Zelenka will recite a poem in Czech. A few others are going to recreate their own country's traditions... there'll be a song and, um... Dr. Kusanagi is going to tell a story her grandmother told her about being in Hiroshima... " Dr. Weir's eyes lit up with an idea. "If there is some Athosian tradition you want to perform, Teyla, we'd be honoured."

Teyla nodded, feeling a small lump growing in her throat, pressing at the spot just behind the knob. Dr. Weir wanted to include the Athosians among the honoured dead of the Lanteans. Something hot burned the back of her eyes and she blinked it away. "Yes," she said softly. "There is... something like that among my people. I will need a candle, if that is alright with you."

"Of course," Dr. Weir said. "Anything you like. The ceremony starts at eleven in the morning. Tomorrow. Would you mind going... um..." She craned her neck to peer over at a schedule that she had left on her desk. "Second last?"

"Of course," Teyla said again. "That is no problem." She stroked the fabric petals of her poppy and thought fondly of her father for a long moment. It was a good tradition, Teyla thought. Then, "Why poppies?"

Dr. Weir blinked for a moment, then understood Teyla's question. "That part is Canadian. There was a poet. His name was Dr. McCrae."

"McKay?" Teyla echoed, looking over her shoulder at where Major Sheppard and her own Dr. McKay were conversing amiably in the hall outside the office door.

"McCrae," Dr. Weir corrected. "He was a soldier in the first world war, a doctor in a field hospital in a place called Flanders Field. He wrote a poem about the poppies that grew on the soldier's graves."

"And why is this tradition Ka-nay-di-an?" Teyla asked.

"Dr. McCrae was Canadian," Dr. Weir explained. She made a motion and Dr. McKay caught it, popped his head into office.

"Yeah?" he asked.

"Where was Dr. McCrae born?" Dr. Weir asked him.

Dr. McKay scrunched up his face for a second, his lips going twisty. The answer came to him and he said, "Guelph, Ontario. About... three hours drive south of where I grew up. Why?"

Dr. Weir made a graceful, closed-fingered motion to indicate the poppy on Teyla's jacket. "I'm explaining the poem to Teyla."

"Oh," Dr. McKay said. "I hope you're not being as long winded as my grade nine English teacher."

Dr. Weir stifled a laugh. "I don't think I am."

"Good," Dr. McKay said, "Because seriously, what fourteen year old boy gives a crap about extended imagery and twittering birds when the guy was talking about blowjobs."

"What about blowjobs?" Major Sheppard asked from behind Dr. McKay, leaning casually on the railing on one elbow.

"It wasn't _actually _about blowjobs," McKay defended, his voice slowly ascending towards that tone where he was trying to cover a slip of the tongue, his hands fluttering. "It just says _poppies blow. _I was fourteen, okay? We were all fourteen. We all _thought _it."

"I never thought it," Major Sheppard said with a smirk.

"You just heard it for the first time today," McKay snapped back. "And yes you did. Your eyebrows wiggled."

"My eyebrows don't wiggle."

Teyla grinned. Beside her, Dr. Weir sighed. She waved both men into her office and they came, shutting the glass door between them and the control room, along with any further talk of inappropriate-for-work-materials.

"I would like to hear this poem about blowing poppies," Teyla said.

Dr. McKay blinked. "You would?"

Teyla nodded.

Major Sheppard elbowed Dr. McKay in the small of the back. "Yeah, go on Rodney. Recite us a poem."

Dr. McKay narrowed his eyes at Major Sheppard in a way that clearly said, _I hate you._

"Please, Rodney," Dr. Weir said, with all the tone of a diplomat, undercut with just the tiniest bit of glee at his obvious discomfort.

Dr. McKay blew out a long suffering sigh, licked his lips and said, "Ah, okay, okay. Gimmie a sec. It's been... longer than I want to admit. Uh..." And then he closed his eyes and screwed up his face in the way that said he was searching through his self-professed giant brain, rifling through the drawers and cabinets of memory with snapping, dexterous fingers. Then he took a breath. "_In Flanders Field, where poppies blow, between the crosses row on row that mark our place;"_ he began. His voice was soft at first, unsure, the cadence and timbre by rote. But as he spoke the words returned to him and he eased into the rest of the poem.

"_And in the sky,  
__The larks, still bravely singing fly,  
__Scarce heard amid the guns below._

_We are the dead.  
__Short days ago we lived,  
__Felt dawn and sunset's glow;  
__Loved and were loved.  
__And now we lie in Flanders Field._

_Take up our quarrel with the foe.  
__To you, from failing hands, we throw  
__The Torch.  
__Be yours to hold it high.  
__If ye break faith with those who die,  
__We shall not rest,  
__Though poppies grow in Flanders Fields."_

The poem ended and there was a collective moment of breathlessness.

Dr. McKay was not the most skilled orator on Atlantis, but his voice was strong and rang with a sort of pain and pleading that Teyla thought, perhaps, it would not have before he had left Earth. This time the words held meaning for Rodney McKay, in a way they never had before. It made that tight spot in Teyla's throat constrict just that bit more.

As if startled by his own recitation, Dr. McKay's eyes snapped open. His lips parted and he sucked in a quick, startled little breath. And then he said, "Oh."

"Yeah," Major Sheppard agreed, and jammed his hands into his pockets.

Dr. Weir was stroking the worn petals of the little flower on her jacket with her fingertips. Her eyes were very bright.

"That is beautiful," Teyla said, and meant it. "I am looking forward to hearing it again tomorrow."

"Tomorrow," Dr. McKay said softly. "Yeah. Tomorrow. I... I left something... in the lab... I have to... yeah."

And then he was gone.

Major Sheppard followed after Dr. McKay. Teyla gave Dr. Weir a moment to compose herself, and filled the heavy, thoughtful silence with finishing her tea.

When the brightness faded from Dr. Weir's eyes a little, Teyla rose and said, "I must go and prepare." Dr. Weir stood as well, her face slightly paler than it had been when Teyla had come in to ask about the scarlet flowers.

"Yes, yes," Dr. Weir said. "I'll, ah... I'll see you tomorrow. Morning. Eleven o'clock." And then she turned her back to Teyla and made a motion as if straightening her hair, but Teyla knew that she was scrubbing at her eyes.

"Dr. Weir," Teyla said softly, and the other woman turned back around. Teyla reached out and grasped Dr. Weir's shoulders gently. She leaned forward and bowed her head slightly, and touched her forehead against Dr. Weir's; comforting, stabilizing, _I am here for you and I understand_. "There is no shame in sadness. There is no shame in missing them. Your expedition members, or your kin who fought in these World Wars."

And then Dr. Weir broke.

Teyla stood there and let Dr. Weir support herself on her shoulder, petted her hair as if she would that of a child. The tears came hot and fat, and dried up just as quickly. Sixty seconds; ten tears; one hert-wrcking sob. The Leader of Atlantis could afford no more. Dr. Weir retreated into herself, and out of Teyla's arms. She wiped her cheeks on the sleeve of her shirt and smiled. The smile was forced and flat.

"I'm sorry," she said.

"Do not be," Teyla said. "Even leaders may cry for those they have lost."

Dr. Weir bit her bottom lip and nodded once.

"It makes you human, Dr. Weir."

Dr. Weir blinked heavily and nodded again.

Teyla would cry, tomorrow, she knew. When Dr. McKay, or whoever it was, said the Poppy Poem again. She would think of all those the Wraith had taken. She would think of the worlds ravaged and the friends vanished. She would think of her father. And she would cry.

And there was no shame in crying for them.

END

_Lest We Forget._


End file.
